A Eulogy

I always thought my father would live forever.

Of course, that's not yet possible, but it always seemed that if anyone could do it, it would be Dad. I don't know anyone who did more things, went more places, or had more different kinds of experiences in their lifetime than Dad did. He and I didn't always see eye to eye, maybe because we were a lot alike, but there was never a time when I didn't respect his opinions, judgement, and experience.

I know to other people it may not have looked like it, because we fought every time we had the chance, but Dad was the only hero I ever had, or needed. We fought a lot, because it was his way of testing my ability to think for myself, something he prized. He always told me that the worst thing you could do was to let someone else think for you. Even if you make the wrong decisions, they have to be yours.

Dad worked all his life to take care of his family, and to take responsibility for his decisions. He taught me to do the same. Dad wasn't perfect, but he never stopped trying to improve himself. He knew more than most people ever imagined, and kept learning new things every day. He struggled against more adversity than most people ever get in one lifetime and, for the most part, overcame it. He had the greatest intellect I ever met, and the courage to admit when he was wrong, something that most people lack.

Dad's courage in the face of adversity, strength, intelligence, determination, and dedication to what he believed were a great inspiration to me, and I'm sure, many other people who knew him.

He was the only hero I ever had, and I loved him.

This concludes my portion of my father's eulogy. What follows is my brother's.

When I was nineteen, I got into a car accident in a Honda which I had owned for two weeks at the time. The collision was in the front end, and left all the important components sitting about two feet shy of the bumper. Perhaps out of unwillingness to give up my car, I decided to repair the vehicle myself at home, an ambitious project to say the least. My father and I spent nine months of Sundays pulling damage out of the frame, and squeezing in replacements for every imaginable part. I must have driven that car a full hundred miles before it caught fire, perhaps a mile for every hour my dad spent working on it with me.

And that's the kind of person my dad was, that regardless of how ill-advised were my goals, my dad would have invested any amount of time and effort to help me achieve them, making me feel I was capable of anything.

I want to thank my father today not only for raising and providing for me, but also for being able to tell me when I was wrong, but be on my side looking out for my best interests even when I was.

My dad was one of the few people in the world who shared my sometimes peculiar sense of humor, or perhaps I shared his. I want to thank him today for teaching me to see the humor in any situation, as he always could.

In my dad's life, he's owned businesses, scraped animal hides, run a convenience store and a transmission shop, been a mechanical engineer, a boxer, a taxi driver, and even a war hero. Through his example I've learned to work hard, and that no honest job is unacceptable if it provides for your family.

My parents have told me a story again and again about when I was a child, learning to ride a bike for the first time, and I fell down over and over. I want to thank my dad now for watching me, even though it must have been difficult sometimes throughout my life, letting me fall so that I could learn for myself how to keep getting back up.

I want to thank my dad also for teaching me loyalty and honesty, teaching me to think for myself, teaching me through his myriad examples to be a loving husband to my wife, and a nurturing father to my son, and most of all for teaching me that there's always something else to learn.

I hope that as I move on in life, that ultimately I can answer to that legacy that my father has passed on to me with his love.




F. J. B.
8/12/1933 - 12/20/2005
Rest In Peace, Dad.